whoa that is creepy

Lauren, that is a BAD LOOKING wormy-thing.

Will you do us all a favor, please, and send this image to Baldo Villegas? Contact me, privately, if you need his address.

I don't know what it is, but I think I don't want it living in my area!!

Jeri

Thanks, Jeri- I have sent you an email about his contact. It's a NASTY little thing. I already killed it, but have never seen anything quite like this before. When I went to kill him he actually stood up as tall as he could on his tiny little legs, vertically, and looked like he wanted to pick a fight. Luckily I am much bigger than he is ;) So the bud and dead insect are now in the garbage.

Oh my hell, that thing is creepy!

I devoutly hope Baldo can tell you what it was.

Jeri

The caterpillar on top of the rose bud is an inchworm. The adult is a geometrid moth. This group of caterpillars are occasional pests of roses and generally when I see their damage, I look around for fresh damage or their frass (=bug sh*t) and once I find the critter, I grab it within my thumb and index finger, and I give it a good squish! I then clean any of the bug poop on the sides of my shirt as I might be picking something to eat from the garden later on.

Here is a link that might be useful: Baldo's Bugs and Roses Website

Thank you Baldo.

I've never seen one of these. Are they common in Southern California?

We just returned from a trip through AZ, NM, OK, TX, and back, and in the NM area (where they have had drought conditions) they are experiencing a "plague of moths" not dissimilar in appearance to the adult form of this. They're around in big swarms, and are a halacious pest.

Jeri

Wow! Thanks so much for your help! Glad to know it's just an inchworm. Thanks so much!

My husband hates moths (as they eat the wool of his old suit collection), so won't have a qualm about giving these guys a good squish :)

Thanks again!

We killed 20 of those big moths in one evening, in our motorhome, while in New Mexico.

I DETEST moths!

Jeri

When it stood upright, it was pretending to be a twig so you wouldn't want to eat it.

Last summer I had something similar eating my rose buds, leaving holes and preventing them from opening. An oily looking residue (poop?) accompanied the mess. Keeping my fingers crossed they do not return.

Lauren just count yourself lucky--I had an inchworm in my salad once! The waitress offered to get me another salad, but the colleague I was at lunch with (who had quite the warped sense of humor) piped in with it probably came with brothers and sisters and lots of friends. I opted for soup.;)

Baldo, thanks for the great link. That info has already come in handy. I noticed this foamy spit stuff on a couple of my roses and was wanting (hoping?) to blame the dog, but spit that stays for days at a time? Nope, Zephyr didn't cause THIS on the plants. This time (no his m.o. is to sit on them with all his 110+ pounds of blunk and smash them *g*). Thanks to your excellent bug info I now know the culprits--spittlebugs! Also was able to identify another pest that has been happily munching on roses. Katydids.

Melissa